Research and business

Industrial PhD students popular in spite of crisis

Get a researcher to join your business. Such is the offer to the businesses opening their doors to the Industrial PhD Programme, in which a PhD student works in the corporate sector while at the same time working on his/her business-related research project.

CBS has 29 industrial PhD students, and in 2009 alone seven ones new were hired. Last year, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation approved 98 applications in Denmark.

- An industrial PhD helps the business boost its knowledge base, thereby strengthening one of Denmark's most important resources. It is a decisive factor in terms of whether or not we can call ourselves globally competitive. This is why we continuously strive to strengthen the programme at CBS, says Associate Dean of Research Flemming Poulfelt.

Open to the public sector

The Industrial PhD Programme is popular with the corporate sector, and the businesses continue to apply in spite of financial recession. At the same time, the programme will get more funding in 2010 than ever before, and it is now also open to the public sector, which is applauded by the Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation Helge Sander.

- We could have feared that in times of crisis, businesses would refrain from employing industrial PhD students. But we have received almost as many applications in 2009 as in 2008. That shows us that the businesses have welcomed the Industrial PhD Programme and that it has become part of the corporate sector's research and development strategy, says the Minister.

Facts

The Industrial PhD Programme has been granted record funding in the government’s Finance Act. All in all, DKK 135 million has been granted to new projects in 2010. A new addition is the DKK 10,5 million that have been earmarked for projects in the public sector and the DKK 13 million for industrial PhD programmes in businesses with departments in China as well as Denmark.

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